I was really psyched to see C. Ben Mitchell on one of the panels speaking before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on the health care mandate. Besides having a long list of qualifications, he's also a Colson Center Fellow.

Along with Ben Mitchell, I would have loved to have seen women like Paige Cunningham, executive director of the Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity, or Jennifer Lahl, the founder and president of The Center for Bioethics and Culture Network sitting amongst the men in panel one. (There are plenty of other women who are experts in the field of bioethics as well.)

Once again, Gina Dalfonzo hits the proverbial nail squarely on the head in her Christianity Today article, "Erasing Women." There were women on the second panel that spoke. However, in future -- although pro-abortion strategists would still find a way to distract attention from the real story -- pro-life advocates ought to tighten their strategy by ensuring that a woman is on each panel.

Comments:

I concur with Gina, however, I would say it a bit more strongly. Instead of being a mere "token" or after-thought, women need to be invited give expert testimony alongside men. Life issues, after all, affect everyone.

Posted By: Kim Moreland on February 21, 2012 3:01 PM

Well, that depends, Jason. If someone really went into it with the thought "Let's have a token woman!" then that *would* be a little demeaning.

But the argument I was making, and that I believe Kim was echoing, is this: If pro-lifers consistently get mostly men to talk about the issue, then -- however inadvertently -- we allow the other side to paint themselves as the only ones who really listen to women. And they then go on to frame abortion and related subjects as the primary "women's issues." That's wrong and dangerous and we should do all we can not to be a party to it.